Judgments of A Fearful Man

Reworking of "Clarence, the Boot Polisher"

Originally I posted this article a couple of months ago. While no one directly challenged my terminology at the time, I referred to Clarence Thomas as a boy who had failed to become a black man. At the time I was searching for the worst possible to call Unjustice Thomas, and I hit upon the idea that to call a black man a “boy” was just about the worst possible and most demeaning insult a white person, like myself, could perpetrate on black MANHOOD. As I said, I had every intention of belittling Clarence Thomas, but in choosing the refrain “boy” because it is a term white men use to suggest black men are not capable of becoming MEN, I came to realized I had placed a group insult upon all black MEN. As such, I have rewritten this post under that considered personal re-evaluation of my terminology. I still mean to show Unjustice Thomas that I feel he is a gnat and his judgments are feeble attempts to not be swatted into oblivion by whites. I still hope to point out the Unjustice of the Unjustice Judge who makes judgments of fear that has grown into powerful and hateful despair. But I hope I have corrected my own poor judgement in selecting the terminology I utilized in the previous post. It is in no way meant to validate or apologize to the gnat’s mishandling of his role as a man permitted to judge other men. But I must apologize for my own presumptive insult against all black MEN. If you’ve already read the post previously, the only changes I have made are an attempt to make the terminology directly related specifically to Unjustice Thomas and hopefully have reframed the article to that specificity and not an indirect attack upon all black MEN.

The last two paragraphs have been totally rewritten, however,and I hope will reflect this effort.

Like most people who think about justice, Clarence Thomas has been on my mind for many years with his poorly reasoned decisions, inadequate comprehension of legal precedent, and just plain legally contrarian positions.  I never saw in Thomas too much of a judicial philosophy, other than a turncoat anti-black philosophy.  

Of course we all continue to talk about his confirmation and the sexual harassment allegations brought forth.  But before the accusations were brought forth, I already knew he’d been lying…and lying…and lying.

Thomas had a paper record, not a very intelligent paper record—basically a parrotted record that reflected the paper record of Robert Bork—who’d been rejected for the court because of that record.  Thomas also had a very clear administrative record at EEOC that showed a very defined position against the entire purpose of the EEOC. 

    Question:  What is your opinion about…”

    Lie To Committee: To answer that would prejudice my ability to be judicially impartial.”

    Truth:  He already had a definable record that illustrated his position.

    What he was doing:  Hi-tech lynching the committee who were afraid to hi-tech lynch a black  man they goddamn knew was lying because they already knew the answer because he already had a clear written or policy answer.

So after Dobbs absurd concurrence I researched to learn as much as I could.  Now I think there is a certain degree of lying in Thomas' book.  

Point # 1:  He might have played sports, but I played sports and I know a bit about the kind of success with one’s fellows if one is a varsity sports performer.  It is certainly probably true that one may not of necessity become better liked, or attain a personal popularity, so to say as Thomas does that he was as popular for his sports activity and as unaccepted outside of his sports that he claims does not quite ring true to me.  And granting that athletes can react differently to the “fame” he gathers playing sports. Some players might take such fame more humbly, some more responsibly, some might think, in Mr. Trump’s words, “others let them to do” whatever roughshod they might choose to think their fame entitles them to do.  Well that’s pretty much the same as “fame” of any kind can be responded  to by one who sees himself acclaimed for anything.  Of course the responses might not equate directly.  From those who have been around  say, Ted Nugent, who have reported prior disagreement with his politics and expected to dislike him and find him very giving and differential.  Fame of course does not make a person “happy” because no matter the level of fame one might achieve, it does not alter the personal needs and desires before fame occurs.  Brian Wilson is an example of someone who certainly achieved a great deal of fame and certainly wanted fame, but found the fame so overwhelming his prior personality sent him over the edge in achieving it.  All four of the Beatles reacted differently, Paul probably embraced it the best but also had the greatest obsessive need to maintain it, George, while not totally being overwhelmed like Wilson, did try to designify it and ignore it, John had more difficulty.  He had the greatest drive to be recognized as a human, but he both scoffed at deserving it and used it to try to influence others’ behavior and yet at the same time he needed a strong personality in his own life to enable him to survive it.

What rubs me wrong about Thomas’ claim that he was the “best” basketball player and the “best” pitcher is not his feelings of being rejected even though he achieved such fame, what rubs me the wrong way, that it was a lie or a boast rather than an actual fame is that none of the reactions he ascribes to others to his on-field success in any way ever seems to be a description of admiration,a recognition off-field of his achievements on-field does not ring true.  Certainly it might be that the achievements did not alter his own feelings of not being worthy. And yet everything in his biography is about how hard he worked to get fame, academically, within the black movement, etc.  And then after Yale by achieving  a corporate law position. And then the rejection by others who pointed out his adequacies, and Clarence continually makes reference that he was among the best and then someone knocks him down, (rejects him).  Denies to him that he just ain’t as good as he thinks (or wants to think he is.)  But the puzzling thing is that no one ever points out he isn’t very good at sports, he was never rejected, but no one seems to acclaim him for it beyond the field either.  He might have played sports, but I can’t place it within the context of his story.  There is no rejection, but there is just no recognition and recognition is most what Clarence needs from others.  

First of all, success at sports, unlike academic, or work-life success, can be attained almost immediately with performance.  You  need to continually get top grades before you can be acclaimed a”smart kid”, one test doesn’t do the trick. You don’t have to accomplish a feat, say in law, write one successful brief, win one big case–because you won’t even get the chance for that break until you prove you deserve it.  One case might bring you fame, but that one case requires continuous proof of one’s ability to be afforded the big case.  A writer might achieve instant fame with a first book, but I guarantee you it’s not the first thing they ever wrote, even if it might be a first publication.  And of course in sports the same is true if you are to become a Jabbar, a Jordan, a Babe Ruth, a Jim Brown, etc. But although I never saw Jabbar’s first sky hook, I’m quite certain it achieved immediate fame.  I’m only 6 '1 and was never capable of a slam dunk, I could barely get high enough to dunk at all, but the first time I was able to do it in a game, I got immediate recognition where everyone remarked and congratulated me, even the opposing team and their fans congratulated me after the game.  So I simply cannot believe he was the best and thought to be the best, or seen to perform athletic miracles that those feats would not have achieved recognition from others.  Especially since the whole book is about one incident after another of thinking he has been put down and his entire life story is about seeking someone to recognize him for achievements before he earned them.

Point #2: Clarence says he became conservative after the riot in Roxbury.  He says he ran home and discovered he really didn’t feel he belonged in the black movement.  Something’s wrong here.  He ran home, okay, let’s say that’s true, but the turn to conservatism probably did not come from a philosophically inward reflection, but either from being rejected once again for not staying and fighting; or more than likely he was so shitlessly scared that he was too afraid to ever put himself in harm’s way again; or possibly some rejection for running and a whole lot of fear.  Fear runs throughout his life.  He was afraid of his community in PinPoint, he was afraid of his grandfather, he was afraid of the black students at the catholic school, afraid of the white students after desegregation.

There is this continuous dialogue that Myers abused him, locked him in a closet, whipped him.  Well whipping with a belt was not necessarily considered abusive at the time (I think it is) but I know many a child who was whipped with a belt and didn’t necessarily consider it abusive (and some that did) and while I never was, most everyone I grew up say there parents sometimes did use a belt to punish them.  Right or wrong, most of us in that generation survived it. And his brother says rather than being locked in a closet, Clarence  would run and hide in the closet to avoid work.  

He claims he left Conception when Martin Luther King was shot because he “overheard” white students proclaiming they were glad King had died, and he couldn’t continue to go to school with such people.  Clarence says his grandfather washed his hands of him because he didn’t want to continue to be a priest.  I reject that.  His grandfather had educated him and had attempted to teach him blacks were and would be continually put down and would need to be strong in the face of abuse. When Clarence said his grandfather rejected him only because he didn’t continue to pursue a priestly career does not seem to cut the mustard either. The whole message that Myers Anderson had tried to impart to his grandson was that the only way that the black man can stand tall and look himself in the mirror is to deny the white man the satisfaction of cowering the black  man when he struck at him. The black man would always be subject to abuse but could fight that abuse only if did not submit and allow himself to let the white man think he could knock him down. And so after everything his grandfather tried to illustrate to him, flees because he overhears—-he is not even directly confronted, just overhears—other white students suggest that they were glad King had been killed—-what does little Clarence do (little because he remained essentially over-encompassed by his own feelings of being diminished and little in comparison to others) he flees, he quits, he says because he can’t remain in an institution with white people who feel that way. What I see, what I think Myers saw, was a failed black man who remained afraid of the white man, and could not stand tall against the white man’s abuse.

So his next step is of course to be recruited into an institution that is seeking not two or three black students but 20. Safety in numbers, I suppose, Clarence dons panther attire. He says he was an active leader of his black dorm mates, encouraging and leading their efforts for better treatment. We all know the attire, we’ve seen his picture in the beret and the posture of his panther-era photos. Again there is a confusion in my mind. Yes, he is remembered by his fellows, white and black, for joining “radicalism”, but no one remembers his initiative in leading the black demands. Which would be unusual by Thomas’ behavioral standards, anyway, and by his own admissions, that he was afraid to talk before others. And administrators do remember Thomas during their negotiations with the newly admitted black students. They remember him near the door, seemingly ready to flee should anything untoward occur.

Did James Meredith suffer no abuse when he became the first black student at Ole Miss or run away the first time he did?  Did King quit when he got arrested?  Did John Lewis hide when he was beaten near to death at Edmund Pettus Bridge? Did the students Bull Connor turned his hoses upon give up and never attempt to enter a white school again? Come on, Clarence was just damned afraid to stay, just as a single riot in Roxbury once again scared him so badly he ran from black activism.  Just as a few rejections didn’t turn him against his Yale education as worthless, but his own fear of ever being rejected.  Come on, every other black student at Yale with him have said they got hired in the field they aspired to.  But how much do you want to bet that none of them never received any rejections?  And somehow I’m not quite convinced he was at the top of his class, most of those who attended with him suggest he was probably somewhere in the middle, or “average”---still average Yale is worth a lot more than top at Taylor University where I attended.  And quite frankly, Thomas doesn’t really seem corporate law material to me.  He definitely has a drive to be accepted, but I’m not at all sure that is what corporate law firms are looking for.  Look at Barack Obama, he was not really corporate law material and recognized it, but Michelle was.  But again, saying he was rejected by recruiters, and being notorious for never speaking to anyone except John Bolton, and that was only in intimate and unheard conversations, no one else at Yale ever heard him speak. And if one is applying for a job in a steel factory, a person must speak to his interview. I don’t imagine any law firm was seeking lawyers afraid to open their mouths. So if he were rejected by top law firms, then it was not because of affirmative action, it was because of unaffirmative Clarence who was still afraid his voice would be mocked as geechie-pigeon years after he probably did not remember a single word of geechie.

So to sum: Clarence Thomas is sort of honest when he says the first people who ever accepted him were the white conservatives. But his job with John Danforth was obtained because of Danforth’s need to put some blacks into the attorney general’s office and I don’t think for one single moment that John Danforth (who attended Yale law school) didn’t hire him because he attended Yale law school as an affirmative action student.  Come on, Clarence, don't pull the wool over your own eyes, he hired you because you did have that Yale law degree, and because you were an affirmative action student.  The conservatives didn’t embrace you because you were of their class.  They embraced you so they could say they had found a boy, and that all good blacks were boys.

You’re still not a man, Clarence, you have allowed yourself to be used as not a man, but as representation to the white man of the meek and humble servant they feel a black man should be. You are not the billionaire’s friend, they embrace you to do their bidding. What they do not realize, Clarence is they wouldn’t even need to pay you off, all they need do is command your obedience, the obedience of the white master and you would loyally serve because you just were too afraid to grow up and talk back to the master.

And your concurrence in Dobbs is the proof.  You’re a little angry judge with a pulpit to punish everyone for attempting to have self-respect that you never had because you were just way too scared to become a black man.  You might have at one time admired a  black man, you might have put his poster on your wall, but just as your grandfather failed to teach you, a black man is only a man when he refuses to succumb to the white man. He wants him to never be more than a servant, their servant, their boot polisher.  That’s all you are Clarence. A vengeance bent little warlock with a black robe whose judicial philosophy is not conservative at all, but  the philosophy to take as much as can from everyone as long as he can have his ego stroked by those he is afraid of.

You are not just scared and frightened Clarence, you are inadequate to be  qualified to be anything more than a servant to those you fear and afraid that at the slightest misstep you might be tied up and horsewhipped. You didn’t have the guts to realize that when they gave you that robe tom wear you didn’t need to be afraid anymore. But the only scales you can weigh are the imbalanced scales that have marred and prevented you out of cowardice to understand that justice is to prevent the fears you faced from needing to be faced by others. But the fear so overwhelms one side of your scale it falls straight to the floor and the only measurement you can make is to replace your own humanity with servitude to those who have no regard for humanity. Clarence, that does include you.

No wonder your grandfather turned his back on you. He tried to teach a black man cheapened his own manhood, even more than the white man cheapens his, when the white man cowers the black man into dancing for his supper. That, Clarence, is what you did, and you insult not only all black Americans when you covet the approval of the white billionaires you dance for in your fearful misjurisprudence, but you insult yourself even more and were I Myers Anderson, I would despise you for you running into the closet to escape your own lack of strength, and that is all you have ever demonstrated. They say you ran and hid again when Ms. Hill challenged you. They report you hid and were found curled into a fetal position by your wife and Senator Danforth. You say you hit on the concept of a “high-tech lynching,”. I imagine it was handed to you by them. No one lynched you, sir, except yourself. You willingly lynched yourself and feebly attempted to project your own weak self-acknowledgement of that fact as what white people were doing to you. You were rejected by a black woman, sir, and the white committeemen did attempt to lynch her credibility sir. But Mr. UnJustice, sir, you had already placed your neck in the noose, and you had already allowed yourself to not dangle at the end of the rope by becoming the white man’s go-to black man.

Unfortunately, Sir Unjustice, you have been dangling at the end of that rope and have swung into obedience of the whites you have allowed to keep you bound into the servitude they desire from you.